In the woods at Bass River, you will find a memorial that tells the story of the CCC and their forest reclamation work as well as the great fire of 1936. The photo display there is excellent. Among the many pieces of information are photographs of what the facilities looked like at that time.
Company 225 served at camp S55, called New Gretna at the time. Three yong men died in the forest fire of 1936, when they were encircled and engulfed by the flames, their escape cut off: Stanly Carr, Edward Sullivan and John La Salle.
Along with the memorial, there are ruins to be found with partial tiled floors that I found particularly evocative, thinking of the young fellows learning trades they could use later in life. They learned carpentry by building their barracks and tiling the floors, they learned to cook, and at certain camps such as the one at Parvin, they actually went to school and learned all sorts of useful things; it was a kind of CCC College. What a most useful and worthy projgram, the results of which will be with us for another couple of generations or longer.
Another memorial worthy of your visit is the fire tower at Bass River, also built by the CCC and considering the dangers of forest fires, a very crucial function.
I hope you are enjoying your Labor day. Sadly, the weather is keeping me in as I don't want to get caught by road flooding as I did a couple of weeks back and spent literally hours on the road trying to get home from a 20 minute errand. Needless to say, I didn't get over to Peter J. Maguire's grave in Arlington Cemetery today, as I had planned to do, maybe later -
Instead, I'm 'scrap-booking' which is my first foray into this wildly popular hobby. My daughter's 30th Birthday is coming up and since she was the most photographed and documented child 'not of a Royal family' I decided to put those mementos and photos to work in a nice reminder for her of the past 30 years.
It was a reminder to me of how fast time flies and all the loved ones I've lost since then, as well as all the fun I've had and the friends I still share my time with.
Some people worry that they won't find things to do when they retire. I wish they would contact me - I have more things to do than I could get accomplished in 3 lifetimes! I used to give my newly retired friends a list of 36 fun places to go and things to do. Along with that, of course, there is blogging! I jsut read an article that siad 66% of retired people find blogging a pleasant activity. I would have to agree and sharing information is always useful.
Happy Trails Jo Ann wrightj45@yahoo.com
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